Echoes In Time Part 20

Gordon lived with his walkie-talkie clipped to his belt. Misha's orders had been to signal as soon as Viktor emerged from the transport. If Viktor had to go back down the timeline for more conferences, at least they'd know.

So he was back. Gordon awaited only the second signal, meaning he should get to the meetpoint, wherever that was.

All, of course, before darkness fell. Which would be very soon.

Eveleen opened her mouth to ask how he'd managed to juggle his job so he could accommodate all this moving around, but was prevented by a quick knock at the door.

Ross opened it-and all four came in, Irina, Vera, Misha, and Viktor.

For a moment they all stood there, a silent tableau. Eveleen scanned them, noting the posture of each: Irina graceful and aloof; Misha standing near her, one fist propped on a hip, an ironic smile on his handsome face; Vera standing very close to Misha, unnoticed; Viktor leaning against the wall, looking exhausted, his dark hair lying in sweat-damp strands across his broad forehead.

So many people crowded into a tiny room made the walls close in, and Eveleen was aware of the sharp smell of stale sweat.

Almost at the same time, Misha grimaced and said, "It is very hot today, and in the jungle there are no amenities-"

"Come on," Ross said, gesturing toward the fresher alcove. "It's not palatial, but it's better than what you've been stuck with."

They disappeared inside. Eveleen heard Ross's voice explaining how everything worked as, in silence, Vera pa.s.sed out the evening's ration of food.

Her eyes were lowered, her generous mouth, almost always smiling, was uncharacteristically somber. Eveleen guessed that Vera had discovered the open frequency and had broken the silence rule-and Misha had taken advantage of it to meet and make his report in person.

Gordon-wisely, Eveleen thought-said nothing. It was apparent from Irina's posture that she had already spoken her mind to her colleague.

The two Russian men emerged then, and everyone sat in a circle to eat.

"Viktor?" Gordon said, once Viktor had taken the edge off his appet.i.te. "You did not report to them ill-"

"I did what you ordered: wrote out a letter stating our symptoms, copied it onto a disk. Sent it forward. Valentin came back to say come forward to report in person."

"They are sick as well," Misha said, saving Viktor from having to frame his report in English. "Same symptoms, came on about the same time."

Viktor then spoke. "Zina. She wants to end the mission."

CHAPTER 21.

ROSS REACHED FOR the makeshift calendar that he and Eveleen had begun.

Rapidly he totted up the days, then he looked up at Eveleen and nodded.

Everyone's count was the same: they were on Day 46, and had fifteen days until they reached the same number the First Team had stayed before Katarina disappeared.

Viktor said, "Zina makes order to us. Despite how we know that First Team did not all vanish that day, still, we must be gone by same day. Our time." He frowned, said something swiftly in Russian, then he rubbed his eyes tiredly.

Misha continued for Viktor: "Even if one of us disappears, as did Katarina, it is still too much. We either solve the problems we face in fourteen days-without courting extra risks- or we must just leave, return home, and give our bosses the problem."

Viktor added. "They will withdraw to the ship on Day Sixty, and get ready for takeoff. We must be there by sunset, Day Sixty." He looked up and met Irina's eyes.

Ross, watching idly, felt a spurt of surprise when he saw the man's jaw tighten. He shifted his own gaze to Irina, in time to see a tiny nod, but then she turned her attention down to her laptop-on which her fingers had been steadily typing.

Gordon said, "As long as we have Saba, I agree. But I do not leave without her."

Irina said, "We will not plan to leave without Saba." She spoke in the same kind of calm, flat voice as Gordon used.

Vera said quickly, 'Why not right now? We can get her out, and leave now."

Misha struck his hand against the wall, a sharp sound that made everyone jump.

Ross hadn't realized until then how tense they all were. Tired, sick, yes, also tense.

"This mission is not failed," he stated, his accent strong. He gave Irina a cold-eyed stare. "We have time. I will will find Svetlana." find Svetlana."

Irina just stared back without speaking.

Ross slid a glance at his wife. Eveleen watched the two Russians, a sober expression in her eyes.

Misha said, "I have translated all her writings. I can retrace her steps, and if we go back to the day she disappeared-"

Viktor spoke in Russian, gesturing with his hands. Irina also spoke, and Misha produced a disk from his pocket. He handed it to Irina, who took it without comment.

Ross saw Gordon following this action. He said nothing.

When Irina had finished putting away the disk, Gordon said in a quiet voice, "Zina is right. We don't know what this disease is. The fact that we all have it, at both ends of the time line, makes a strong case for the First Team having been afflicted with the same thing. And though we haven't found bodies, we don't know if the First Team died before they vanished-there are too many anomalies. Until we solve at least one, we cannot go back and risk the same thing happening to us."

"Then we find out," Misha said. "You get Saba out, I solve this, my own way."

He turned to the door, hit the control. He went out without speaking another word, and Viktor, with an expressive shrug, followed.

The door closed, its sound loud in the sudden silence.

"Let's go over the facts," Eveleen said in a voice of compromise. "We know we're all sick-but our scientists don't know the cause, or the disease. We know that the First Team were not together, and that they did in fact disappear on different days, but no one earlier than Katarina, the archivist."

Vera said, "Misha won't rest until he finds some kind of evidence. He..." She paused, rolling her eyes.

"Mikhail Petrovich," Irina enunciated in her clear, emotionless voice, "is a romantic." Her tone equated romantic romantic with with fool fool.

Gordon said diplomatically, "He's determined to make the jump up to the First Team's time, and perhaps that is a way to find out what happened." His voice sharpened subtly. "But it might just endanger us without solving anything at all. Until we collect enough evidence to know for sure, let's not end up with the same mysterious fate. And so we're back to our original problem: we must determine, if we can, exactly what happened to them, and why."

Ross nodded, without speaking. Vera made a noise of agreement. Irina shrugged.

Gordon went on, "So let's split up, and do whatever we can to put together the few puzzle pieces we have. See if we can get some sort of picture, something to act on safely. In the meantime, nothing seems to have happened to us-" He gestured to the walkie-talkie clipped to Vera's belt. "So I rescind the silence rule. But let's use good judgment. We still have to a.s.sume that someone who can jam can listen in."

"We speak in English," Vera said. "Russian, someone might know, or have on record from a hundred years ago. English would still be new."

Gordon nodded.

Vera gave Irina a questioning look. Irina nodded politely at Gordon, Ross, and Eveleen, then went out, her footfalls noiseless.

Ross thought about that cold, angry glance as he and Eveleen got ready to sleep. Eveleen seemed troubled; Ross glanced over at her a couple times as he rolled out their futon. She was sitting cross-legged on the floor, typing rapidly into her laptop.

When she finished, she closed the laptop and sat back with a sigh.

Ross said, "Any intuition about what's going on in Irina's head?"

Eveleen looked up, slightly startled. "You too, huh?"

Ross shrugged. "I have to admit I'm having trouble figuring these Russkis. I don't know if it's me, or them, or I'm just not a sensitive kind of a guy-"

Eveleen laughed. "Meaning you scent personal gossip behind all the angry looks and so forth. Well, so do I. We do know that Misha has romanced most of the women in the Russian service. We also know he pulled strings to be sent on this mission. I suspect that his relationship with Svetlana wasn't just lighthearted flirtation. How Irina fits into this is anybody's guess."

Ross grimaced. You didn't get this kind of talk on a mission with all men-and, he reflected, you probably didn't get it on missions with all women. Put 'em together, and what do you get?

"Chemistry," he said out loud.

"Hmm?" Eveleen asked, blinking. "Oh! Misha and Irina?

Well, either that or politics. I can't pretend to understand them all. Irina especially. All I know is-or rather, all I sense sense is that Irina and Misha are going to be competing in some way, he to solve the mission, and she to get us back to Earth before we end up like the rest." is that Irina and Misha are going to be competing in some way, he to solve the mission, and she to get us back to Earth before we end up like the rest."

"So you don't think she wants to solve the mystery."

Eveleen paused in the act of brushing out her hair, and shook her head. "I think Irina has decided it's impossible, and she wants to wrap it up and move on."

Ross sighed as he dropped down beside her on the futon. His thoughts ranged from Misha and Irina to Saba, hidden in the House, and from there to his own situation-the Jecc game. He hadn't mentioned it to Gordon; it seemed so unimportant beside all the other crises.

But as he lay there, his mind drifting, his thoughts came back to that word chemistry chemistry.

After a little while, the light sensors, detecting no movement, turned the lights off. Eveleen's breathing had already become deep and even; she was asleep. Ross closed his eyes and tried to clear his mind.

Dawn the next morning was again clear, they discovered when they left the Nurayil dorm. Clear, hot, and humid.

"Ugh," Eveleen said, then she cleared her throat and somewhat breathlessly made a comment about the weather.

Ross obligingly forced his mind to switch from the quicksilver ease of his native English to the heavy freight train of Yilayil. Weird, how his brain refused to get used to this language, a problem he'd not had on previous a.s.signments.

He asked-in Yilayil-"Have you trouble with speech in the Yilayil?" He chose the word for thought/mind/speech, realizing as he whistled and hummed the words that this was his problem, the words weren't one-for-one exchanges.

"I concur," Eveleen trilled. "To think/speak..." She hesitated, then said quickly in English, "Every word is a paragraph." She looked guiltily at Ross, then went back to Yilayil. "Practice perhaps would take a year."

Ross didn't answer. He knew they were both thinking that they didn't have a year.

They reached their workplace then, and the cool, shadowy building was a distinct relief after the early morning heat.

As Ross took up his station, he considered their performance so far. Back on Earth-what had seemed a thousand years ago-everyone had blithely a.s.sumed that he and Eveleen would be able to attain driver status without any problem, thus being able to sneak rail-skimmers out and move the teammates around as needed. At least so long as their destinations matched with the hidden rail system. They'd a.s.sumed that Misha and Viktor would of course find the bodies of the First Team, all located in the same place, having been buried on the same day. They'd a.s.sumed- His attention splintered when he felt a dry, scaly hand at his side.

The Jecc!

The game was on.

He'd almost forgotten them. Quick as light he imprisoned the small fingers working at the communicator attached to his belt. The Jecc went very still, its pupils contracting as it stared up at him.

Ross spoke without thinking, repeating the same phrase used by the Jecc that caught him stealing, all those days ago: "My progeny will be swift."

The Jecc's gaze seemed to intensify, then fast as lightning it scuttled away.

Ross turned to his work, picking up where he'd left off in a complicated a.s.sembly the day before. The Jecc encounter was momentarily forgotten.

It didn't stay forgotten long. Within a very short time he became aware of a change in the behaviors of the Jecc. He'd become the center of their focus-not just the stealing, but they seemed to move about him in busy circles, humming a kind of shorthand Yilayil.

The only time they faded away was at midday break, when Ross went to find Eveleen. As soon as he addressed her, his Jecc followers vanished like a tide receding.

"Something weird's going on," he murmured in an undertone.

"Danger?" She used the Yilayil word.

He replied in the same tongue. "No, I believe not. A change, a transition..." Again he felt that the words carried too many meanings, and choosing them was like carrying a mental backpack up a hill, whereas English was like light tiles, easily chosen, enabling him to sprint tirelessly. Frustrating.

He changed the subject to something innocuous as they forced down something to eat. The midday sun was blisteringly hot, and the air outside the transport area was almost overpowering with heavy scents.

When he was done he peered against the sunny glare off walls and roofs, and made out the dark green line of the jungle in the near distance. Weird. It felt as if it encroached menacingly.

"No appet.i.te either?" Eveleen asked-in Yilayil.

He shook his head.

She sighed. "I noticed we are all thinner."

Ross thought back to the night before, and nodded. He hadn't been aware of it, but when he considered the Russians and Gordon-Eveleen was right. Of course, that was to be expected, since they were all sick.

But he didn't feel feel thinner. He felt, if anything, too heavy. thinner. He felt, if anything, too heavy.

That had to be the heat-and the illness.

He dismissed the thought, and drank some water.

Then it was time to return to work.

As soon as he was alone, the Jecc returned, circling around closer than ever. So it went for the rest of the shift. No one stole anything, but the Jecc stayed close, as if watching him, though they did not stop their work either.

It was when he shut down his workstation that the same Jecc came forward who had addressed him so aggressively on the first day in this department.

"I, Bock of Harbeast Teeth Islands, take Ross of Fire Mountain Enclave to nest for Day of Lamentation."

Ross stared down at the little being. A threat? Or an invitation?